Universidad de AntioquiaCapacitación Docente en Lengua Extranjera Inglés

Basics I

Presentation

The program of “Capacitación Docente en Lengua Extranjera Inglés” has been thought of as a space for the university faculty to share knowledge and increase negotiated interaction1so that they could develop their communicative competence in English as a foreign language2. Since independent work, self-assessment and the use of technology have been found to foster student autonomy through the development of learning strategies such as planning, self-evaluation and self-monitoring3, these teaching-learning practices will be privileged along the different courses of the program.

Justification

In the globalised world in which we live, there is a growing need to communicate in English, either to keep up with the cutting edge scientific development carried out elsewhere latitudes or to make our own known overseas. Consequently, promoting the development of the faculty’s communicative competence in English becomes indispensable to achieve the competitiveness that the University has identified as one of its objectives in its development plan4.

Course Objectives

Generalo To promote the development of communicative competence in English as a Foreign

Language, EFL. o To promote negotiated interaction among the students and the teacher within a friendly

atmosphere.

Specific

Regarding the socio-cultural component: At the end of the course, the students will…o exchange Greetings and leave takings within formal and informal situationo exchange basic information about oneself and others: job, place of origin, family,

place of residence, important dates, etc. o exchange basic information about daily and leisure activities.o exchange basic information about the time: the hour, weather and seasons. o exchange information about food and prices. o be able to express similarities and differences between the Colombian culture and

English speaking countries’ cultures within the contexts determined by the unit.

Regarding the grammatical component: At the end of the course, the students will…o acquire the lexicon as well as the morphological, and phonological competence needed

to communicate successfully within the contexts specified in every unito create simple sentences with “be” in present simpleo create simple sentences with verbs different from “be” in present simple

1 Kumaravadivelu (2003)2 The Common European Framework for Reference, Savignon (2001)3 O’Malley & Chamot (1990), Wenden (1991), Benson & Voller (1997), Benson (2001)4 Plan de Desarrollo Universidad de Antioquia 2006-20016

Regarding the discourse component: At the end of the course, the students will…o create short conversations including yes-no and information questions o organize short paragraphs using commas and periods accurately o write their personal profile

Regarding the strategic component: At the end of the course, the students will…

o acquire some linguistic strategic abilities that could facilitate communication within the contexts specified in the program: verifying information, using interlocutions, using the alphabet

o acquire reading and listening strategies such as skimming, scanning, prediction, activation of previous knowledge, usage of the dictionary, etc.

o develop some learning strategies that could help autonomous learning to take place: planning, self-monitoring, self-evaluating, cooperative work, etc.

o use technology as a valuable resource that facilitates the development of student-autonomy.

Methodology This course is intended to be carried out within an approach that privileges communication within a negotiated interaction context as the one proposed by the post-method pedagogy. It is considered paramount to place the student as the center of the teaching-learning process where the teacher’s role is overall the one of an organizer, facilitator and support.

With the purpose of developing communicative competence5, the students will utilize written, audio and audio-visual material along with technical resources such as the Internet. The teacher will follow the textbook “American Headway”, which they will complement with other authentic or graded resources according to their criteria.

Activities such as practical workshops, presentations, role plays, readings, and small projects, either in class or out of it, will be carried out with the aim of developing competence in the four skills: reading, writing, listening and speaking.

The use of the mother tongue as a teaching-learning strategy is recommended only in the events in which it might be considered pertinent to facilitate comprehension. Likewise, the promotion of cooperative work as a teaching-learning tool as well as the use of technology as a student autonomy motivational and promotional factor, are highlighted.

Contents

Unit 1:o Exchanging greetings and farewellso Exchanging basic information about oneself: name, origin, telephone number o Countries and daily use objects. o Numbers 1-20 o Personal pronouns and possessive adjectiveso Simple present of "be" o Plural of nouns o The alphabeto Short dialogs

5 The Common European Framework for Reference

Unit 2: o Exchanging basic information about otherso Introducing peopleo Asking for and giving priceso The family and the cafeteriao Numbers 20 - 100o Interrogative and negative sentences with “be” o The noun possessiveo Letter to a friend

Unit 3: o Exchanging information about worko Talking about jobso Asking for and giving the timeo Most common jobs and related activitieso Personal pronouns and possessive adjectiveso The simple present tense: affirmative, negative and interrogative sentence structures:

third personal pronoun singularo Writing a personal profile

Unit 4: o Exchanging information about one’s daily activities: at work, at home, in our free time o Expressing opinion about leisure activitieso Expressing frequencyo Seasonso The simple present tense: affirmative, negative and interrogative sentence structures: I,

you, we and theyo Frequency adverbs

Follow up and evaluation

Objectives of the course and evaluation criteria will be presented and discussed with the students. Formative assessment practices, understood as those that aim at measuring achievement within the process and helping students to improve their skills, should take place before summative events arrive. The use of rubrics (Picón, Goodrich Andrade) is highly recommended as evaluation tools for self- and teacher-assessment both during formative and summative events. The assessment system is suggested to be completed as follows:

Follow up: 60%It could include

o A portfolio made out of worksheets, short compositions, writing activities based on reading assignments, etc.

o Presentations, interviews, role-plays and other oral production activitieso Listening comprehension exerciseso Small projectso Quizzes

Final written exam: 20%

Final oral exam: 20%